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The purpose of this article selection was to explore the different effects of various
stretching methods on speed and agility performance in correspondence to conditioning level. I
believe that this article was given to us to read and critique because it provides a great insight
into what shouldn’t and should be done for athletes to better their overall performance. It is also
important to have an understanding of speed, acceleration, and agility skills to give the athletes
the best possible training regimen.
Introduction
Static stretching has been deemed a staple of sport conditioning programs and warmups
for quite some time. However, it is important for specialists to understand what static stretching
can do to the body compared to dynamic stretching or a combination of the two. Warming up
before physical activity is vital as it increases the athletes core body temperature, whereas
stretching helps to increase the range of motion of one or more joints (Chandler p213).
According to research, there has been a “decrease of 8.5% in sprint performances,” and a
“decrease of 5.6% in the agility test performance” when utilizing static stretching alone, whereas
dynamic stretching have had more of a positive impact (Kilit et al., 2019). The participants of
this study performed a sprint and agility test with different types of stretching prior. The purpose
of this article was to observe how different methods of stretching can change the outcomes of
agility and sprint test results.
Methods
This study used twenty-six male tennis players and they were separated into different
groups of stretching: static, dynamic, static+dynamic, dynamic+static, and no stretching (Kilit et
al., 2019). These athletes were cleared of any musculoskeletal injuries, trained for 4-5 days per
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week, and had a minimum of two years of experience training prior to this study. The athletes
were put into different levels of classification in order to determine the stretching methods for
their performance level: good performers (GP, n=13) and moderate performers (MP, n=13). For
each group minus the no stretching group, the athletes participated in the same eight-minute
warm-up with a three-minute rest period and thirty second stretching program; followed by
another two minutes of rest and the agility and sprinting test (Kilit et al., 2019). The warm-ups
included skipping, jogging, and side/back stepping. The main muscles targeted during their thirty
second stretches were the hamstrings, quadriceps, gastrocnemius, hip flexors, hip extensors, and
adductors (Kilit et al., 2019). Rest was not given in between the stretches, however, the control
group did rest following the eight-minute warm up as they did not participate in stretching.
Each participant completed a total of eleven sessions during their pre-season. Both the
speed and agility test were selected randomly for the athletes, and they were given forty-eight
hours of rest in between. The athletes performed the T-drill test in order to gauge their agility
performance and did 20-m maximal sprints (10m split times) with three minutes of recovery for
their sprint test; they began the test in an upright position 0.5m behind the gates. The time was
measured by utilizing portable electronic timing gates. In order to calculate the athletes best time,
they each had two rounds of the tests with three minutes of rest and the best time was used.
The methods of this testing are fairly straight forward and simple; however, it would be
more beneficial for the authors to have measured the athletes heart rates throughout the tests.
This would give a better insight on the benefits of the types of stretching and a good look into the
control group who did not stretch, rather they rested for eight-minutes post warmup.
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Results
After analyzing the data, it was clear that there is a substantial difference between the
10m acceleration, 20m sprint, and T-test time between the dynamic stretching, static stretching,
and combined dynamic+static stretching groups. There were no significant differences between
the dynamic stretching and combined static+dynamic stretching. As for the types of performance
groups (good or moderate), the GP group showed a better performance within each test for the
dynamic stretching group and controlled group compared to the MP group.
Discussion
The goal of this research was to find out if there were any differences between stretching
methods on performance for acceleration, agility, and speed and how the types of stretching will
affect athletes based off of their conditioning levels. In the Effect of Acute Static Stretching on
Force, Balance, Reaction Time, and Movement Time study, the authors found that acute bouts of
static stretching reduced the effect of the athletes warmups for conditioning with balance,
reaction, and movement time (Behm et al., 2004). Dynamic stretching and CSD stretching have
both proved to increase the performance of athletes speed, acceleration, and agility (Kilit et al.,
2019). By using these stretching methods and following a proper warmup routine, speed and
agility performances have improved due to the increased blood flow to the muscles. If an athlete
does decide to incorporate static stretching prior to their training, it has been noted that anything
under thirty seconds does not have a negative response on muscle force production (Ogura et al.,
2007). Something that the authors might consider changing in the future is a larger sample size
as this one only had twenty-six participants and they were all young males.
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Conclusion
To conclude, the purpose of this article was to observe the differences between static,
dynamic, static+dynamic, dynamic+static, and no stretching and the effects it has on young male
tennis players speed and agility. It was found that the dynamic stretching and static+dynamic
stretching were both able to improve the tennis players performance. I believe that it’s important
to note that static stretching that lasts no longer than thirty seconds will not have a negative
effect of the athletes, as well. It is safe to say that athletes, no matter what the sport, should begin
training with a form of dynamic or combination stretching for optimal training results, which
will transfer over to their competitions.
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References
Behm, D. G., Bambury, A., Cahill, F., & Power, K. (2004). Effect of acute static stretching on
force, balance, reaction time, and movement time. Medicine & Science in Sports &
Exercise, 36(8), 1397–1402. https://doi.org/10.1249/01.mss.0000135788.23012.5f
Chandler, T. J., & Brown, L. E. (2019). Chapter 9. In Conditioning for strength and human
performance (p. 213). essay, Routledge.
Kilit, B., Arslan, E., Soylu, Y., Effects of different stretching methods on speed and agility
performance in young tennis players, Science & Sports, Volume 34, Issue 5, 2019, Pages
313-320, ISSN 0765-1597, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scispo.2018.10.016.
Ogura, Yuji; Miyahara, Yutetsu; Naito, Hisashi; Katamoto, Shizuo; Aoki, Junichiro. Duration of
Static Stretching Influences Muscle Force Production in Hamstring Muscles. Journal of
Strength and Conditioning Research 21(3):p 788-792, August 2007.
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